The United States remains somewhat bitterly divided over the same-sex marriage debate, and it’s tough to take a point on the issue without alienating half the country. Mitch Albom, the celebrated author of Tuesdays with Morrie, took a stab at it in a thought-provoking column that ran in the Detroit Free Press last year, reprinted online by the Alaska Dispatch News.

His take was an unexpected one that “honors” marriage no matter what side of the issue you find yourself on. With some statistics putting divorce rates at nearly 50 percent, Albom felt like both heterosexual and homosexual marriages could learn from that. “People are people. Fights, losing interest, losing passion, finding someone else — do you think this is the sole purview of heterosexuality?” he writes. “While we are consumed with who gets to get married, many nations are losing interest in the institution. In France, the Netherlands — even Italy, with its stereotype of the big family — marriage is becoming passe. Why burden themselves with vows and commitments?”

Albom feels that is the bigger issue in the marriage debate and to prove his point, he cites a case in the Michigan Supreme Court where the child of an estranged lesbian couple was forbidden to see the non-biological mother by the biological mom. “Critics lamented that if they were legally married, then divorced, the child and denied mother would have rights to see each other. So we’re now using divorce to justify more marriage?” he asks.

“The only thing we can be certain of is that all of this will land in the U.S. Supreme Court soon. Meanwhile, can we at least agree that, no matter what we think of someone else’s marriage, we could all put more emphasis on our own?”

And there’s the takeaway. But to expand on this a bit and make it relevant for people who are either divorced or about to go through the process, there are two lessons to learn here:

1. Don’t worry about how the world looks at you because you’re divorced. Just concern yourself with improving your life and making positive life decisions. Let the divorce live in the past and be the catalyst to a new beginning.

2. Should you remarry, focus inwardly and don’t allow others’ lives to remove your focus from the work involved in forging a strong relationship.

If you’re at the point of no return in your marriage and aren’t sure what steps to take next, check out some of our online divorce reviews of both attorney referral and DIY forms services to see which best applies for you.